Every human being is intended to have a character of his own; to be what no others are, and to do what no other can do.
To give a generous hope to a man of his own nature, is to enrich him immeasurably.
I am a living member of the great family of all souls; and I cannot improve or suffer myself, without diffusing good or evil around me through an ever-enlarging sphere. I belong to this family. I am bound to it by vital bonds.
Nothing which has entered into our experience is ever lost.
Fix your eyes on perfection and you make almost everything speed towards it.
All virtue lies in individual action, in inward energy, in self determination. There is no moral worth in being swept away by a crowd even toward the best objective.
Faith is love taking the form of aspiration.
Every man is a volume if you know how to read him.
May your life preach more loudly than your lips.
It is not the quantity but the quality of knowledge which determines the mind’s dignity.
The best books for a man are not always those which the wise recommend, but often those which meet the peculiar wants, the natural thirst of his mind, and therefore awaken interest and rivet thought.
God be thanked for books; they are the voices of the distant and the dead, and make us heirs of the spiritual life of past ages.
No power in society, no hardship in your condition can depress you, keep you down, in knowledge, power, virtue, influence, but by your own consent.
We smile at the ignorance of the savage who cuts down the tree in order to reach its fruit; but the same blunder is made by every person who is over eager and impatient in the pursuit of pleasure.
Precept is instruction written in the sand; the tide flows over it and the record is gone; example is graven on the rock, and the lesson is not soon lost.
Every human being has a work to carry on within, duties to perform abroad, influence to exert, which are peculiarly his, and which no conscience but his own can teach.
Influence is to be measured, not by the extent of surface it covers, but by its kind.
It is chiefly through books that we enjoy intercourse with superior minds. In the best books, great men talk to us, give us their most precious thoughts, and pour their souls into ours.
In general, we do well to let an opponent’s motives alone. We are seldom just to them. Our own motives on such occasions are often worse than those we assail.
I am a living member of the great family of all souls.